


clothes make the man

by Catory



Category: GARO (TV), GARO: Yami o Terasu Mono
Genre: Character Study, Gen, Rian POV
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-08-02
Updated: 2018-08-02
Packaged: 2019-06-20 11:29:36
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,446
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/15533247
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Catory/pseuds/Catory
Summary: or, heavy is the head that wears the crown.sometime between the events of yamitera and goldstorm, ryuga and rian take shelter from a storm.





	clothes make the man

"For the record," a damp and slightly singed Rian states, "it definitely wasn't my idea to try and start a fire with the Madou Lighter."

God. This smelled so nasty.

Ryuga, equally dishevelled, sputters indignantly. "Hey! I totally know how to start a fire the normal way, I just figured that it would be faster!"

A hard-earned campfire flickers unsteadily between the two, a welcome contrast to the howling winds just outside the cave. Rian ignores Ryuga's indignant huffing in favor of picking morosely at the giant scorch on her trouser knee. "I'm going to have to throw this entire outfit out now, I can't mend this fucking hole. I loved these pants. Do you know how big the pockets were? They were my _favorite._ "

Ryuka blinks. "I… Rian, your pants _already_ had a huge hole in them."

"Well, yeah. But this is different!"

"How?!?

Rian rolls her eyes. _Boys._ Honestly. Instead of replying, she sweeps an eye over the roof of the cave they're in. The part that they're in is a bit cramped— she can barely stand up straight here, and Ryuga hasn't even tried— but it's wide and mostly dry, at least. It’s a decent enough shelter from the howling thunderstorm outside. Rian squints at their sopping wet map. She estimates that they're about one to two day's travel from the nearest village. If she's guessing correctly, of course, they _could_ just be lost.

Either way, they're not getting out of this cave until the storm breaks.

"Hey, gimme your coat." Rian's head snaps up. Ryuga had already shimmied his way out of the majority of his own clothes, and was now wringing out the worst of the rain from them. "Don't look at me like that, we have to hang these up to dry.  I've got some spare shirts in the duffel if you wanna borrow one?"

 _Agh, gross._ But then again, beggars can't be choosers. Rian starts to shrug her way out of her coat and top and passes them over. Out of the corner of her eye, she sees Ryuga hang up each piece of their outfits, hooking them as best he can into a convenient outcropping on the wall above his head. When it comes to his own coat though, he hesitates. He fingers the worn cuffs of his coat with an uncharacteristically thoughtful expression.

"What’s up?" Rian asks as she tugs her corset loose.

"Garo used to wear white, didn't he?" Ryuga says, almost absentmindedly. "In the stories. A white coat, like a light in the dark…"

He blinks, like he hadn't meant to say it aloud.

Rian looks him over critically from where she's digging through his stuff. "White with our job? Don't even think about it." She pauses for a second to tap her chin with one finger thoughtfully. "Unless it was like, a raincoat? I could _maybe_ see a raincoat staying white for more than two days at a time."

Ryuga snorts. "Are you sure that all this water hasn’t made your brain soggy? Garo didn't wear a raincoat!"

Rian snaps back without thinking, caught up in the familiar cadence of banter. "Oh, like you'd know either way!"

Ryuga doesn’t answer, and when Rian finishes tugging the t-shirt over her head, she sees that Ryuga's smile has faded completely. Rian bites back a curse. She must have accidentally touched a nerve.

"That is… well, y'know," she backpedals. "It's not like we know much about Garo anyways. Apart from the stories."

"Yeah. We don't really know much about him, huh." Ryuga doesn't look at her as he continues to worry away at his coat, pulling a loose thread and twisting it around his fingers. "…I wonder what the Garo before me was like. The one who wore the armor as it lost its light."

The light of the fire catches on the metal fang hanging on Ryuga's coat as it sways back and forth. "Do you think he knew what was gonna happen? Was he scared?"

"…We'll probably never know." Rian says, softly. Honestly, she doesn't know where the hell all of this is coming from, but whatever it is, it matters to Ryuga. So as his partner, she should have _something_ to say, right? "Records from that period are spotty. We don't even know what his name was. Saejima something is the best guess we've got."

"Not even a name, huh. I just—" Ryuga swallows. "I just wish I knew more about him. Or any of them. Sometimes I feel like I don't know what I'm supposed to do and— if I could just meet one of them for one day, even if I could just ask one question— I'm Garo now. But what does Garo even _do?_ " His voice rises sharply on the last word in agitation.

Rian's at a loss. It isn't like Ryuga to be… introspective? (Except that's not quite the right word, it doesn't say enough about the sharp fear in Ryuga's eyes.)

"You'll be fine, Ryuga." She starts, trying to feel out the edges of his worries. "You're Garo, the Golden Knight. You won't fail—"

"But that's the point!"  Ryuga's voice rises sharply, as he takes a shuddery breath.

"I _do_ fail! And when Garo fails, people die!"

And Rian doesn't have anything to say to that because

Her mom and dad and countless innocents, Ryuga's mom and Burai

and

**_Enhou—_ **

She knows it's wrong, she was _there_ and she knows it wasn't so simple (and she'll take the blame, too, for not seeing anything was wrong until way too late) and yet…

And yet.

Even though the dust had settled and Volcity was nothing but a speck beyond the horizon, a small and bitter voice at the bottom of her heart still whispers even now:

If Ryuga had been anything like a _real_ Golden Knight, then he could have saved them all.

And it's not fair, but it’s the truth. Because that's what everyone knows that Garo does. She'd heard the stories herself, just like every other child in the village and every other village with Makai Priests and Knights. She'd listened raptly to the tales of how Garo fought and won against Messiah, Mother of Horrors, about how he travelled to the Promised Land and brought back the Fang of Lamentation. A hundred different stories with a hundred slightly different variations and the only thing that stayed the same for all of them was the unshakeable, unspoken feeling that if the Golden Knight were here, no Horror would stand a chance against him.

Garo was the light of hope in the darkness.

Garo could save them all.

And that was _fine,_ when Garo was still just a legend and not a real, flawed person who was Rian’s friend.

What could she possibly say to Ryuga? That it was fine as long as he tried his best? But neither of them believe that. There's nobody in the entire world that would believe that.

The silence in between the two of them drags out uncomfortably. Ryuga yanks a stray thread free and shakes his head. "Man, forget it. I shouldn't have said anything in the first place, I’m just tired, I guess. You wanna take first watch or should I?"

It’s an ungraceful attempt at changing the conversation, but it’s not like Rian knows what to say either.

"…Go to sleep, Ryuga. I can handle things." She moves over a little so that she's got a clear shot at anyone who tries to get into their shelter.

“Alright.” Ryuga drags his duffel bag back over to his side of the cave to use as a pillow.

The rain continues to fall outside, and  just a few minutes later, Rian speaks up again, because whatever the hell’s going on with this conversation, she knows that this isn’t a good way to end it.

"Hey, Ryuga? My stuff's getting pretty worn out, so I was planning on visiting a tailor in the next city. If you want to come with me… we can ask. If there's anyone that can make you a white coat. It shouldn't be that hard to find one."

There's no immediate reply, and for a minute or so Rian thinks that maybe he's already asleep.

"...Nah.” He finally says, voice almost lost in the sounds of the storm. “You were right. For someone like me, white's too hard to take care of."

Did she say that? Rian can't quite recall her exact wording. But it's clear that Ryuga isn’t going to talk about it anymore, so she settles back against the cave wall and watches the rain outside. The storm doesn't looks like it'll let up anytime soon.

 

**Author's Note:**

> i have Thoughts on dougai ryuga but also they can basically be summarized as "he's GARO as a depressed millenial cracking under the pressure and i think hes neat"
> 
> thank you for reading!!


End file.
